1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to automated calling systems (such as IVR systems), and, more particularly, to an automated method for determining caller satisfaction with a call.
2. Description of Background Art
Organizations increasingly employ automated systems, such as interactive voice response (IVR) systems to handle calls. Such systems automate communications with callers (or callees, in the case of outbound calling applications; hereafter, ‘user’ is used for both callers and callees) and perform actions in response to user input.
User satisfaction depends on how easily a user is able to progress through the desired call path(s). Users tend to get frustrated when the call does not progress as desired. For instance, in IVR systems where the user is asked for speech input, a user's frustration would likely increase if the system did not accurately understand the speech input.
Known methods for determining user satisfaction with a call include having a human listen to live calls or recorded calls. This is very expensive, time consuming, and usually not practical for systems that experience a large volume of calls.
Therefore, it is desirable to have an automated method to determine user satisfaction with a call in order to (1) enable the system to take corrective action during a call in the event of less-than-desired user satisfaction or (2) let system administrators, based on user satisfaction, identify any problem areas, or compare the caller satisfaction experienced by users of one version of call-processing/voice recognition software with caller satisfaction experienced by users of another version.